One Week 'Till Camping

I will be camping next weekend from Friday through Sunday. I will be spending the weekend with a group of people I've never met in a place I've never been at temperatures I have yet to sleep in. We will be camping on Frazier Mountain, and though it is in the same mountain range as where I live, I have never been there. The trip was organized by Naturalist For You (http://www.naturalist-for-you.org/), a local organization and guide service aimed at promoting environmental appreciation and protection.

I have spent the last several weeks gathering all the needed items in order to have a successful and warm weekend. Though I had many of the components necessary for backpacking, I lacked a compact tent, stove, and cookware. I borrowed all three items from a friend, who backpacked often in his younger days. However, he hadn't used any of them in over a decade. As a result, there was a bit of re-education needed to use them. The tent was very simple to put together, with similar construction to the large 4 person tent my family used on our car camping trips, but I had to do some troubleshooting for one simple and minor problem, but a problem that would take away from the experience greatly. Since the tent hadn't been used in several years, it picked up a peculiar odor that was very uncomfortable to be around. The musty smell resembled old cheese. It was an easy fix, but took me a little while to think of. In the end, I built the tent in my garage and sprayed it with a largess coating of Febreeze to hopefully remove the smell entirely. This worked amazingly and the tent now has a much more pleasant smell. However, it is still airing out, as I'd prefer to smell the crisp winter air and the pine trees over the smell of Febreeze.

The next problem came when I lit the small MSR stove for the first time. The stove burns liquid propane through a hand pump which attaches to the canister. Given the small size of the pump, I felt that it needed several pumps to build adequate pressure. I pumped it nine or ten times, then lit it as the instructions dictated. It lit with ease, but the amount of fuel that I had forced into the fuel line quickly escaped and leaked in a liquid to directly under the stove. The excess fuel then caught fire. The small, controlled burn turned to a large fireball on my stove. Even after I had turned the fuel off, it continued to burn as a result of the fuel that had leaked underneath for 10 minutes until it had all burned off. I then returned to visit John, the friend who loaned me the equipment, to figure out the problem. We encountered the same situation. After some trial and error we solved it. Three pumps seems to be the proper amount to ensure no fireballs followed.

In the next few days I will be buying the last of the things on my list. Namely food and a pair of snow pants. Following those final purchases, I will be packing everything into the 85 liter pack that I've been using to train with. My first winter camping experience is just days away. I hope my feet stay warm.